


Darkness Within

by Anonymous



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Boggart, Book 7: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Dark, Dark Ginny Weasley, Emotional Manipulation, F/M, Fear, Heavy Angst, Horcruxes, Horror, Intimacy, Manipulation, Manipulative Tom Riddle, Mind Manipulation, POV Ginny Weasley, Psychological Drama, Room of Requirement, Suggestive Themes, Temptation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-12
Updated: 2021-03-12
Packaged: 2021-03-20 10:53:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,195
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30003774
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Ginny’s greatest fears are brought to life when she wanders the Room of Requirement after nightfall against her better judgement.
Relationships: Tom Riddle/Ginny Weasley
Kudos: 11
Collections: 2021 DBQ Round One: Boggart





	Darkness Within

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by [TheSlytherinCabal](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSlytherinCabal/pseuds/TheSlytherinCabal) in the [DBQ2021Round1](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/DBQ2021Round1) collection. 



> Disclaimer: The characters do not belong to me but are the property of J.K.R. and Warner Bros. No copyright infringement is intended. The theme for this round of the competition was Boggart and my chosen pairing was Tom Riddle/ Ginny Weasley. Comments/Reviews are encouraged by The Slytherin Cabal's Admin Team on all stories in Death By Quill, but comments left by readers are set to be moderated by story authors until the end of the competition in order to protect participants' anonymity. Thank you to my beta for their time and help.

Ginny’s heart thumped loudly in her chest, threatening to crack her open in the harsh darkness. A deep sigh groaned in the distance, and Ginny felt her blood chill as she shifted in the dirty room. She couldn’t imagine the Room of Requirement bringing just anyone to this version of itself, but she had to be careful. There was no telling whether the room held allegiances either way, and she didn’t want to get caught with her trousers around her ankles if a Death Eater stumbled upon her snooping around for the old potions book she’d hidden the year before.

She pulled her wand close to her and held it tightly, listening intently. 

The figure several metres away grumbled as a metal latch unlocked. Ginny’s ears piqued at the sound, eyebrows furrowing as she wondered if perhaps someone was injured or lost here. If perhaps someone had taken refuge here. Or if they were here looking for something, just like she was. 

A bright light moved somewhere and then snapped off with a small crack, and Ginny hugged her knees closely as her ears waited for sound. 

There was nothing—it was so silent she could have heard the dying breaths of a cricket. 

She waited for several minutes, eyes trained on an old grimy mirror, hoping for any sign of movement. She carefully mapped out the largest obstacles in her mind, eyes fixating on every object she could see lest she need to run. A large cupboard just a few steps to the right, a dull sword with a beaded R on the hilt, a portrait with the face scratched out. She memorised everything around her. It felt arduous, but suddenly a large crash erupted from behind a stack of cabinets. Ginny gasped at the explosion of sound and braced herself as a soft clicking noise slowly approached where she was pressed up against a pile of rubbish. 

“Darling,” a cool voice spoke, and Ginny’s eyes widened. “Where are you hiding?”

She bit her tongue as the clicking noise drew closer as if a pair of sharp claws were dragging against the wooden floor.

“Still so afraid of me,” it spoke again, and to Ginny’s terror, the voice came not from the ever-closer sound approaching her, but from a figure that still stood from where the crashing came. Ginny gulped deeply as the noises converged in her fear-dampened ears. Heavy footsteps began moving toward her from behind now, and she crouched low to hide from view. It was a slow gait, deliberately taunting her, she realised. Trying to draw her out into the open. To _Him._

Ginny lifted her wand to her face and clasped it with trembling hands. With a faint effort, she tried fruitlessly to conjure a wordless Patronus to send warning to the Order, but nothing happened. 

She was trapped, and nobody would know what happened to her. Nobody would ever find her here.

Even if the whole Order searched this room for months, she’d be lost to them. 

“Ah,” the voice chilled, and the clicking stopped just around the corner. “There you are—”

“ _Descendo,_ ” Ginny whispered, and the towering wall of rubbish she was hiding behind collapsed onto the clicking noise. She leapt to her feet and sprinted toward where she knew a door to be, but a dark shadow appeared suddenly before her. 

“—And look how you’ve grown,” he whispered, his wand illuminating a sinister smirk. 

The man flicked his wand, and small embers of light danced around them, brightening the area enough for Ginny to see him in his entirety, and she gasped loudly.

“Tom,” her voice faltered, cracking under his heavy gaze. She tried to reposition her shoulders to stand tall and strong, but as his eyes raked over her, she wished she could curl into a tight ball. She felt as though she were a blooming flower opened wide to accept a wasp, and as his dark eyes observed her every movement, her thoughts seared through her; she would not accept this death. She would not accept him inside her again.

“It’s good to see you again.” He leaned forward, and his breath against her skin felt like insects crawling over her. 

She breathed shallowly as he stepped forward to lift a finger to her hair, refusing to drop her eyes from his. 

“I’m not scared of you,” she tried, standing straighter again, and this time, her voice held the strength she knew lived inside her.

Tom lifted a hand to her waist and tucked himself behind her, pressing her against him. Ginny squeezed her eyes shut as he moved and tried to keep her body from reacting.

“You should be,” he muttered under his breath, his scent consuming her. He was precisely as she remembered all those years ago in the Chamber of Secrets, just as devouring as he was the first time. Just as tempting.

A soft click caught Ginny’s attention, and she opened her eyes wide, pupils dilated almost completely. In the shadows of the artificial bobbing lights, Ginny could just make out the shape of a second figure in front of her, and her breathing spiked. Her grip on her wand tightened as Tom’s hand drifted over hers, her senses fighting over the rush of stimuli. 

“Oh, Tom,” the figure said from the darkness in a distinctly feminine voice that sounded too familiar. “You’re not the one she should be afraid of.”

The woman took a step into the light, and her red hair shone brightly. 

“ _I am_.” 

Ginny’s eyes widened even further as the woman approached her, an exact mirror of herself. Her eyebrows furrowed as the woman bent forward to press her cheek against Ginny’s, sending shivers down her spine. 

Tom dropped his hands and stepped around her, replacing her with the Other Ginny, who was still inches away from Ginny’s face and tantalisingly close. 

Ginny sucked in her breath as the woman turned from her, her eyes trailing as the Other Ginny led Tom to a stray wooden desk.

“Ginevra,” Tom breathed, his voice dragging against her skin as the woman placed sturdy hands against the desk. Tom circled behind her and breathed in the scent of her neck. 

Ginny’s heartbeat quickened at the pair in front of her, fear freezing her in place and intrigue tempting her to step closer. She didn’t even notice her foot rising to approach them until Tom’s eyes darted down, a devilish smirk peeling against his lips.

“Who are you?” Ginny asked as she raised her wand to them. 

Ginevra looked at the wand and then toward Ginny, locking eyes with her. “Oh, Tom, would you believe how brave she is now?”

“Enough,” Ginny tried. “You’ll tell me who you are and what you’ve done, or I’ll kill you now.”

Tom cracked a smile as Ginevra leaned back against the desk, her fingers pulling her dress up around her thighs.

“You can’t kill me,” Ginevra chimed, her voice clear and confident. “We’re the same person. If you kill me, you’re done for.”

Ginny shuddered a breath. “What do you mean?”

Ginevra raised a leg to Tom’s roaming hands, his fingers dipping beneath the hem of her dress and back up again. “Don’t be daft. You know exactly what I mean.”

Ginny’s heart pounded in the soft glow, loud in her ears. It almost felt as though her chest would shatter at any moment. 

“That whole year you let me in,” Tom explained. “You’ve felt me in there still, worming around. You know what you’ve done, haven’t you?”

Ginny opened her mouth, but no sound escaped, so Tom continued.

“You _stored_ me in you. You kept me safe inside all this time. I really ought to be thanking you.”

Ginevra slapped his hand. “You ought to be thanking _me_ ,” she scolded. “ _I’m_ the one who kept you safe all this time. _I’m_ the one who brought you back.”

Tom’s lips turned up at Ginevra’s insinuation, and he looked back at her affectionately, though Ginny noted a ripple of possessiveness in his stance. He held on to her almost as though he were keeping her untainted by Ginny’s presence. She watched as Tom’s hands claimed Ginevra, oblivious as her wand lowered to her side, entranced entirely.

“This isn’t real,” Ginny said aloud, and Ginevra smiled, her teeth gleaming. “I would never—”

“Never what?” the woman interrupted. “Never ask yourself if you’re honouring your blood? Never try to do better than your _weak_ family?”

Ginny shook her head and stood tall. “I would never let him hurt anybody—”

“You already have,” Ginevra taunted, and Ginny felt her throat constrict. “Can’t you feel it? I’m inside you just as much as he is. Tell me you don’t feel the temptation to give in. To let me take over.”

“I—” Ginny stammered, “I don’t want—”

“Such a delicate little dove,” Tom murmured. 

“I am _not_ delicate—”

“I’m afraid you’ve confused her, darling,” Ginevra crooned, her sharp nails rising to brush against Tom’s stubble.

“Stop it,” Ginny demanded, pointing her wand at the woman again. “Stop talking about me like you know me—”

Ginevra rolled her eyes and pushed at Tom’s chest, using him as leverage to pull herself into a sitting position over the desk, her legs dangling off seductively. 

“If you could just look at your eyes, darling,” Ginevra purred, pushing herself off the desk and onto her feet. “You’d see how clear it is that you want to give in.”

Ginny trained the wand’s tip toward her and tried to remember any spell at all, but her mind ran blank. 

Ginevra stood directly in front of her, her tall heels helping her tower over Ginny. 

“It’s a dark world out there,” Ginevra said suddenly, her voice low and eyes wide, hair hiding her face from Tom. “It isn’t safe for us here.”

Ginny’s stomach fluttered. “We aren’t the same,” she pleaded, a lump in her throat. 

“But you know that I’m right, don’t you?” Ginevra asked, her voice tender and comforting. “There are only two options here. I walk out for us, or we both stay here forever.”

Ginny’s eyes began to water, and she glanced back at Tom.

“I can’t—”

“You _can._ You’re strong enough for his world,” Ginevra pressed. “You’re strong enough to live in it; you know you are. There’s a reason he chose us for the diary.”

“Malfoy chose us—”

“ _Tom_ chose us. He loves us. Don’t you want to be safe? Don’t you want to be protected?”

Ginny wiped a tear from her cheek with the cuff of her sleeve, her wand feeling too heavy in her hands. Ginevra tentatively gripped it and pulled, slipping it easily from Ginny’s weak hold.

“Harry won’t make it,” Ginevra whispered. “You know this. Let me in, Ginny. Let me take it from here. You’ve fought so hard. I know how much you want to give in to us... I’ve been inside you this whole time, dove. I know how much you want to join him.”

Ginny’s lip quivered as the wand left her touch completely, and a sudden wave of nausea overtook her. 

With an unexpected lunge, Ginny leapt sideways toward the large cupboard beside her. She wrapped her hand around the thick hilt of the sword and brought it down in front of her, slicing into Ginevra where she stood. The wand dropped from her fingers and fell to the ground as Ginevra’s body crumpled onto her knees, falling face first onto the floor. 

Ginny knelt and grabbed her wand, raising it to meet Tom’s infuriated eyes, but when she stood and looked for him, she found him missing. 

Carefully looking down, Ginny stifled a sob as the woman disappeared entirely in front of her, evaporating into the darkness and leaving her alone. 

Utterly alone.

Ginny looked around and held her stomach to keep the nausea at bay. She wasn’t sure what had happened, and the fear gripped at her ankles, threatening to drag her under. With a final shake of her head, Ginny dropped the sword and sprinted for the door, lighting the room in dramatic shadows for a moment and then disappearing.

From behind a large wall of debris, a deep sigh echoed against the stray furniture, the dreary dust beginning to resettle.

A soft click against the wooden floor crept out of the darkness, a figure reforming where there had been nothing at all. Pulling itself from the ground, the ragged form of a bleak-faced nun stood and brushed her hands on her apron. Her mouth soured in distaste as it walked itself into an open cabinet, closing the doors tightly and locking it from the inside. 

Alone, at last, Tom briefly glanced down to the chipped bust at his fingertips, and on it, a faded and discoloured tiara. He ran his fingers against it and swore ruefully at the fact that he could not yet physically move it back into hiding. Thinking back to the girl and the younger form of himself that the boggart took, he wondered about all that had happened on the outside since he found part of himself stuck in the Room of Lost Things.


End file.
